Poetry Explorer- Classic Contemporary Poetry, CAUDA MORRHUAE, by WILLIAM HENRY DRUMMOND


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Classic and Contemporary Poetry

CAUDA MORRHUAE, by                    
First Line: Poor little tommy cod
Last Line: And so I've arrived at the end of my tail.


POOR little Tommy Cod
Took his best fishing-rod,
Cunningly fashioned of split bamboo;
Likewise his tackle,
Of red and brown hackle,
To venture down stream in his bark canoe.

Tommy had registered,
Solemnly, I have heard,
Promised and vowed, that ere evening fell
Dore and speckled trout,
Black bass and bull-pout,
Would cheerfully yield to his magic spell.

Since time immemorial,
In things piscatorial,
Tho' Magog be famed among knights of the rod;
Yet, making due limit
For what may be in it,
Little Tommy might know it was no plaice for Cod.

Now, in the buoyant sea,
There's so much buoyancy
A Cod if he wishes can easily float;
But in the swift Magog,
Why, even a bullfrog.
Would much rudder perch on the side of a boat.

I told him the dangers
That all who are strangers
Might meet with, in case they should venture below;
For the mill-dam's so turbot
No mortal can curb it,
As those who have tried it must certainly know.

O Tommy, take care of
Your life and beware of
The treacherous mill-dam you shortly shall view!
But Tommy was vain and
He quitted the mainland,
And put out to sea in his frail canoe.

The craft like an arrow
Sped down the long, narrow,
And turbulent channel, where wild billows rave;
Then past Point MacFarlane,
Like shot from a marlin,
Poor Tommy swept on to his watery grave.

When Tom struck the mill-dam,
The mill-dam, the mill-dam,
When Tom struck the mill-dam, he dam'd the dam'd mill;
Why should he strike it,
When there's nothing like it
To test all the best of a mariner's skill?

I saw the craft flounder,
As fiercely around her
The hungry waves leapt on the ill-fated prey;
And each time they struck her
Poor Cod cried for sucker,
But sucker was scarce on that terrible day.

To throw in the river
Some oil of cod liver,
And thereby the grim foaming waters becalm,
Was Tom's next endeavor,
But he found that his lever
Was all out of order, and not worth a dam (mill-dam).

At last he went under,
And, faith! 't was no wonder,
For a Cod shouldn't go where he doesn't belong;
"Requiescat in pace"
I murmur, in case he
Should rise and object to this mournful song.

We found him next morning --
A sorrowful warning;
The short line we chartered, and shipped him by rail
To distant Atlantic,
By way of Megantic,
And so I've arrived at the end of my tail.





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